When one told Plistarchus that a notorious railer spoke well of him, "I 'll lay my life," said he, "somebody hath told him I am dead, for he can spea… - Plutarch

Lycurgus did not regard sons as the peculiar property of their fathers, but rather as the common property of the state,

Many things which cannot be overcome when they are together yield
themselves up when taken little by little.

Nor had the cities of Sicily any trust in him, as they were in great distress, and greatly exasperated against those who pretended to lead armies to their succour, on account of the treachery of Kallippus and Pharax; who, one an Athenian and the other a Lacedaemonian, but both giving out that they were come to fight for freedom and to put down despotism, did so tyrannise themselves, that the reign of the despots in Sicily seemed to have been a golden age, and those who died in slavery were thought more happy than those who lived to see liberty.